When it comes to avoiding holiday weight gain, now you’ve got something new to worry about: political correctness.

You might be choosing calorie-rich, unhealthy foods for yourself in order not to hurt the feelings of someone with a weight problem, according to a new study by Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.

“I don’t think people are always conscious of it,” said Gavan Fitzsimons, a marketing professor who led a team conducting multiple experiments looking at how people make food choices when picking for both themselves and another person. “It works at a very subtle level.”

In one of the studies, people were asked to choose a snack — either chocolate chip cookies or wheat crackers — for themselves and for a woman they did not know. Sometimes the woman appeared as her normal size; other times she wore a body suit that appeared to increase her weight by 65 pounds.

Nearly 60 percent of people chose the same snack for themselves and the other person when she appeared overweight, but only 30 percent chose the same when she appeared at her normal weight.

In other studies, participants said it would be offensive either to give an overweight person healthy food and pile up unhealthy foods for themselves, or to take healthy foods for themselves while giving unhealthy foods to the overweight person.

“Either you’ll smother both plates in gravy, or neither with gravy,” said Fitzsimons. “You don’t want them to think, ‘You smothered my food in gravy because I’m big already.’ On the other hand, you don’t want them thinking you gave them no gravy because you think they should lose weight.”

Experts agree that doing anything other than serving up the same plate is courting disaster.

“It’s a minefield,” said James O. Hill, executive director of the Anschutz Health and Wellness Center, who specializes in obesity research.

Because food is a metaphor, interpretations of serving different foods to overweight people are endlessly complicated. Add to that the larger issue now trending in society.

“Talking about what you eat is almost bad form, like talking about religion,” said Anthony Pigliacampo, co-founder of the Modmarket eatery. “It sparks these crazy conversations.”

He’s noticed that bringing up dietary restrictions, like being gluten-free or vegan, can trigger passionate reactions.

“People are scared to talk about it,” he said, “because it’s such a hot topic.”

No wonder some people prefer to pack on calories they don’t want, rather than risk a holiday-season food fight. Just make the plates the same — or find a way to get out of it.

“Fixing someone else’s plate is so 1950s,” said Mary Collins, a Denver family therapist and registered nurse who specializes in eating disorders.

She doesn’t hear much about fear of offending overweight people in her practice, which is very busy right before the holidays, advising clients how to get off the topic of food and set boundaries.

“I can’t tell you how many young women are scared to go home because they’ve put some weight on,” she said. “I have one woman about 20 pounds overweight who hates it when she goes home and her mother fixes her a plate with very tiny bits of food on it. The message is, ‘You shouldn’t eat so much. I’m going to control your weight.’ “

Holiday parties emphasize the social aspect of food, the same as birthday parties and office parties.

“There is that (peer) pressure,” said registered dietitian Suzanne Farrell. “The holidays are a time of a great deal of external stimuli that takes us away from our own intuitive sense of how to feed ourselves,” Farrell said.

Experts advise having a food strategy before going to parties — not necessarily avoiding tasty treats for you or someone else.

“One of the big issues is portion size,” said Hill. “Really, it’s just the first few bites that taste the best. Take a few bites, eat a little, really enjoy the great taste. But don’t overdo it.”

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